A counselor from Mount Olive, New Jersey has settled a lawsuit against the school district

The Mount Olive School District and its officials have agreed to a $300,000 settlement in a discrimination lawsuit filed by an employee who claimed she was unfairly reprimanded after a former student accused district officials of willfully mishandling bullying complaints. myself.

Megan Troup, a middle school counselor and anti-bullying specialist, settled her lawsuit against the Morris County district in April, according to documents obtained by the Daily Record. The settlement came 14 months after Troup criticized the district after she was named in a lawsuit filed by the family of a student who said their daughter was sexually assaulted at a park but was swept under the rug by district officials.

The girl’s family, who later moved to the district, quietly settled with the district for $750,000 in 2021, and the accused boy and his parents were ordered to pay the girl an additional $40,000. Neither side took the blame.

Troup, the student aid counselor, said it was only after a student’s family took a case to court in 2020 to highlight the school’s alleged wrongdoing that she began to feel hostility from school officials, including former Mount Olive Superintendent Robert Żywicki, who is involved in his own lawsuits against members of the district board. She was later suspended for approximately two to three weeks in 2021, but later returned to work.

Under the terms of the settlement, Troup was placed on paid leave on April 10, the end of the month, when she will return to work at a district elementary school “selected by the board.”

Court documents show that Troup’s settlement does not admit any wrongdoing or liability by either party and was signed on April 29 by Lisa Narcise, the board’s president. Narcise did not respond to a request for comment, nor did Susan Swatski, an attorney representing the district and the Board of Education. Christopher Hager, Troup’s attorney, declined to comment.

Troup’s claims of hostility

Troup was hired in 2009 as a counselor and later took on the role of anti-bullying specialist in 2011. Her initial role was to deal with the family following a former student’s claims of potential harassment, bullying and abuse, or HIB, but she said school officials quickly told her not to do so.

In her February 2023 lawsuit, Troup, a Budd Lake resident, alleged that district officials “intentionally ignored” parent complaints to keep the district’s reported bullying rate artificially low. Troup, who had no prior job performance or disciplinary issues, said that when she refused to submit false HIB statistics to the state Department of Education, the school administration was met with hostility and lowered job performance ratings, according to the filed lawsuit.

She claimed she was denied training and programming opportunities for students and staff, and direct oversight of HIB incidents was suddenly transferred to an administrator who controlled potential cases she could introduce into the system, she alleged. She also claimed she was physically intimidated and threatened by the administration, with one administrator “viciously” throwing an object at her during a meeting, the lawsuit alleged.

Her suspension, she claimed, stemmed from an incident outside her home during which she confronted the girl’s mother, who was involved in suing the district. Troup was also named in this color.

Troup denied failing in her duties as an anti-bullying specialist for the girl — much of her lawsuit pointed to the school’s alleged failures and attempts to correct school officials’ mistakes — and admitted that she told her mother she would “help” her faced with an impending lawsuit against the district, Troup stated.

Troup’s suspension for approximately two to three weeks came after she admitted during a meeting with the girl’s mother that she wanted to “help” her with the family’s upcoming lawsuit against the district.

Troup received a letter of reprimand, was investigated for any assistance she had provided to the family, and later returned to her regular duties, seemingly cleared of any wrongdoing.

The district has seen a number of changes in recent years, with the appointment of Superintendent Dr. Sumit Bangia in June 2023, after serving as deputy superintendent in April 2022 and acting superintendent from October 2022 to June 2023, when she signed it According to her contract, she serves as curator until June 2026.

She replaced Żywicki, who was placed on paid administrative leave in 2022 for unspecified reasons. Żywicki, who has been in charge of the district since 2018, filed a multi-million lawsuit against board members and resigned from the district last year. In an explosive letter to the board in May 2023, Żywicki claimed that a majority of the board and his legal representatives prevented him from returning to the district because of their “malicious actions, anonymous letters, rumors and innuendos.” The case remains active in state Supreme Court in Morris County.

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